The Orlando Sentinel from Orlando, Florida • Page 23

I The Orlando Sentinel Men respond to date-rape column Working Women, D-5 MONDAY, March 8, 1993 Name that tune? No problem A new computer catalog helps befuddled music-store customers find the song they're looking for. By Jim Abbott OF THE SENTINEL STAFF It's hard for a music fan to keep his dignity sometimes. Like when your girlfriend tells you she must have that new song she heard on the radio. You know the one, she says. The dance song by Mariah Carey.

Hmmm. You have heard the song once. But the radio guy didn't bother to announce the title. So you end up at the counter of your record store, singing something that really shouldn't be attempted by anyone with a trace of testosterone in his system. There ought to be a better way.

That's the idea behind Muze, an interactive computer data base filled with information on 96,000 compact-disc and cassette titles in pop, rock, jazz, classical and other genres. Two of the machines which wouldn't look out of place at a neighborhood video arcade have been installed at the Peaches Music and Video store across from the Florida Mall on Orlando's South Orange Blossom Trail. Now a boyfriend can reserve the serenade for his significant other. Simply by typing out Carey's name on the Muze keyboard, the system's touch-sensitive screen will quickly cough up a list of her albums and the songs they contain. A few more jabs of the finger will transfer the information to a computer printout complete with the section of the store that contains the release and a bar code for ordering out-of-stock items.

Since the machines arrived Monday at Peaches, customers have spent so much time on them that it sometimes makes store manager Bill Winborne a little nervous. "People will sit here and play with it for hours," he said. "Sometimes, I want to remind them that 'Hey, it's OK to go out into the store and buy But for clerk Rob Phillips, it's a welcome alternative to listening to all those questionable Please see MUSIC, D-2 ROBERTO GONZALEZSENTINEL Instead of singing a few bars to a clerk, Romel Roberts seeks help from Muze and its touch-sensitive screen at Peaches music store. Straight stuff on posture Because of benefits like reduced fatigue and a look of poise, good posture is becoming a good notion again. Areas People with good posture have less fatigue and fewer back and neck pains: Here are some tips that can help free you of the stress and strain of bad posture.

of concern By Gary Legwold Here are the 3 natural curves of the spine HEALTH FITNESS NEWS SERVICE that are most prone 0 to stress and strain from bad posture. Stay light. Excess waist weight pulls your spine out of line. The cervical curve Where the spine bends fnnAarrl clinhtlw at tha Greg Dawson TELEVISION WESH left in dust of latest ratings race The first meaningful results are in from the ballyhooed change in the way A.C. Nielsen gathers ratings for the Orlando TV market.

Among the apparent winners in the switch are WOFL-Channel 35, WKCF-Channel 18, WFTV-Channel 9, WCPX-Channel 6 just about everyone, in fact, except WESH-Channel 2. In February, Nielsen switched from handwritten diaries to electronic meters to determine the viewing habits of its 300 Central Florida test homes. "I love the meters," said Channel 6 general manager Mike Schweitzer. The February meter ratings show why. For the first time since the '80s, WCPX's 11 p.m.

weeknight news didn't finish last in the Nielsen race. It edged out WESH by a tenth of a rating point for the No. 2 spot behind market leader Channel 9. While Channel 6 saw gains and Channel 9 remained steady, Channel 2 news suffered sharp erosion at both 6 and 11 p.m. in its ratings from a year ago, when Nielsen families were filling out diaries.

That pattern was repeated in sign-on-to-sign-off (all-day) ratings. The big winner in this category was Channel 35, which picked up an average of 16,000 homes a day over November '92, the last diary rating period, said WOFL ratings guru Tom Meek. WKCF grew by 12,000 homes, WFTV by 10,000 and WCPX by 3,000 households. WESH was flat for that period. One more Nielsen note: Inside Edition, which airs weeknights at 7 p.m.

on WCPX, averages about an 8 rating. But on the night of its Benny Hinn expose (I use the term loosely) the rating spiked up to 14 thanks no doubt to feverish hype on Channel 6 news. Question: If the activities of bouncing Benny the faith healer were worthy of major chunks of news time, why didn't Channel 6 do the story itself? Why did it wait for a syndicated tabloid show to "investigate" a man who lives in our midst? This wasn't a story, or even a story about a story, since there was no news in Inside Edition's report on hyperventilating Hinn. Channel 6's efforts were follow-ups on a nonstory, hype in the service of hype. Channel 9 reporter Anita Smith is leaving WFTV for WBBM-Channel 2 in Chicago, where she will join two other Channel 9 alums Rob Stafford and Jon Duncanson.

"It came out of the blue," said Smith, 29, a native of Springfield, 111. "You could have knocked me over when they called." I don't think I've ever seen more dramatic on-air improvement in a TV reporter than I saw in Smith during her four years at WFTV. She began as a pathetic bumbler and leaves a smooth operator. Smith made her final appearance on Channel 9 on Sunday. Healing and the Mind, the superb Bill Moyers series on alternative medicine, was a good news-bad news thing for WMFE-Channel 24.

The good news is that the series, which aired over three nights, attracted a huge audience by Channel 24 standards: upward of 40,000 homes each night. A local follow-up program the second night, featuring WFTV-Channel 9 health reporter Barbara West, drew 520 phone calls from viewers. The bad news: On the final night of the series, only 17 viewers responded to a station plea and phoned in donations. Yes, it's pledge-drive time again on Channel 24. Come on, folks, pony up.

Just think of it as a "contribution." The made-for-TV movie Silent Cries (9 to 11 tonight, WESH-Channel 2) is sort of an all-female version of the great 1957 film The Bridge on the River Kwai, except there's no bridge and no one will remember Silent Cries 35 years from now. It's based on an historical novel about a group of American and British women struggling to survive in Japanese prison camps in Singapore during World War II. Gena Rowlands plays a writer who stands up to the diabolical camp commander the role played by Alec Guinness in Bridge on the River Kwai. Silent Cries is an inspiring story but not an especially inspired movie, despite a fine cast that includes Chloe Webb (China Beach). Gail Strickland (Dr.

Quinn, Medicine Woman) and Judy Parfitt (The Jewel in the Crown). Two details that broke my concentration: Rowlands kept reminding me of Murphy Brown, and the evil commandant seemed to be doing a bad impression of John Belushi's Samurai dry cleaner from Saturday Night Live. neck. Drive with the seat comfortably close to the steering wheel. If you don't have to stretch to reach the steering wheel, you're more likely to keep a straight upper and lower back.

Help to prevent the onset of osteoporosis by getting plenty of vitamin and 7 JeSt) Posture once commanded a great deal of attention. Hard chairs with straight backs were the norm. Teachers and parents insisted that children "sit up." Books were balanced on women's heads. Men who served in the military knew how to get those shoulders back. Then along came James Dean, TV, bucket seats and reclining chairs, and things relaxed.

"It was and is part of the scene to be casual and somewhat slouched," says Shirley Sahrmann, who is associate professor of physical therapy and neurology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Those who refused to pooh-pooh notions of proper posture, however, have benefited. They experience less fatigue, have fewer back and neck pains, and project poise, confidence and dignity. Advantages like these are making good posture a popular notion again.

"I see posture as paralleling nutrition," says Sahrmann. "People once thought that proper diet wasn't all that important. Now diet has been implicated in cancer, heart disease and osteoporosis, and people are aware. They know that subtle changes take place over time. The same is true with posture.

People don't notice changes day to day, but cumulatively they do." Baltimore physical therapist Florence Kendall recalls that posture photos once were used in physical education classes to help to clearly define good posture. "I was told my hips and back were not in good line," says Kendall, co-author of Muscles, Posture and Pain (Williams Wilkins). "It was just a little admonition, and I never forgot it." Examining your own posture photo, taken from the side, can help identify problems. Is your head held erect? Are your shoulders in line with your ears? Is your chest held moderately elevated, with the upper back erect? Does your lower back have a slight forward curve, and is your tummy flat? If the answers are yes, your posture is good. If you don't have a photo, try this method.

Stand with your back to a wall, heels 3 inches out. Place one hand behind your neck (back of hand against wall) and the other behind your lower back (palm against wall). If you can move your hands back and vfremni The thoracic curve Where it curves back slightly at the area just above the shoulder blades. "i Skip the high heels. By wearing heels, you'll throw the back's natural curves out of line.

The lumbar curve Where the spine curves inward slightly at the lower back. Sleep on a firm mattress on your side with knees bent, Such a position will help to straighten the fower back. Source: American Physical Therapy Association; Sentinel research DANA A FASANORFNTINri Please see POSTURE, D-2 3 Small talk plays a big role in our lives By Craig Tomashoff LOS ANGELES TIMES SYNDICATE firm your territory. It's a way of feeling liked and accepted." Or it can lx a geographical thing. "Being a Southerner, that's the hardest thing for me," explains Park Overall, co-star of the NBC sitcom Empty Nest.

"I just can't stand those embarrassing silences. When I'm at a Beverly Hills party, I'll ask the wives of powerful men what it's like to be married to those men." Mark Smith, who works in a personnel department for a California department store, agrees. "I hate silence. If it's quiet, I always have to start a conversation." At a party there's no way to avoid interaction, Small talk becomes a way of making others feel more comfortable around Please see TALK, D-2 yank somebody into your life, or you're using conversation as an invisible force field to keep them out. "You can be wanting to connect with another person, and small talk is your entree to more meaningful conversation," says Oliver.

"Or it may be used to push someone away so as to not have any meaningful conversation. Each approach is probably used with the same frequency." The way people use small talk is determined by where they happen to be at the time. Take the elevator, for example. Nobody knirws anyone and there's no reason to start a conversation, but invariably, someone does. Making conversation in such peaceful social settings, according to Oliver, "can con the air with empty words that are quickly forgotten.

But you should know that small talk actually has a big place in our lives. "We need it," says Dana Gould, a Los An-goles-based comedian, "We need to seize any form of communication with each other because we have so few left." "I come into my office every morning and start the day with small talk with my secretary," says Pat Oliver, assistant professor and chair of the communication arts department at Ityola Marymount University in I)S Angeles. "I come in after spending an hour and a half on the freeway raring to do business, but that doesn't always happen. If I don't make that small connection with another person, I can't work." With small talk, you're either trying to Hi there. How's it going? Oh, fine.

Fine. How about this weather, huh? Well, I guess we can always use the rain. So what do you think of the Lakers' chances this year? What's that? This story? Oh, just a little look at small talk. You know, those seemingly meaningless conversations you have dozens of times a day. Maybe you're waiting for the elevator.

Or in line at the bank. Or in a hallway or at a party. It all seems pretty trivial. Idle chatter alxut traffic doesn't do much more than fill UJ.